Locating business establishments, such as for example a restaurant satisfying the particular need of a customer, has hereto for generally required access to printed directory listings, or more recently access to the World Wide Web using a personal computer. The availability of such references is frequently quite limited at the time the consumer desires to avail themselves of particular goods or services. For example, an out-of-town visitor driving in their automobile and approaching San Francisco might decide to stop and have dinner in a fine Italian restaurant and more particularly might like to have dinner in a fine Italian restaurant located in the particular area of the city, or to partake of a particular gastronomic delicacy. That visitor would likely not have a printed directory in their automobile or mobile access to the Internet to search for a restaurant satisfying their current need. Therefore, the visitor would likely either have to stop and asked for recommendations or drive around until a restaurant satisfying their needs might be located. Perhaps tens of minutes or hours later than desired. This approach is clearly inefficient, and the visitor may not have the dining experience expected if the restaurant they happen to see while driving turns out to have poor quality food, poor service, or both.
An analogous dilemma arises for other goods and services, whether provided to the local residents or to a visitor from out of the area. Frequently information is not available to a consumer (perspective purchaser) when he or she needs such information, and with the proliferation of a fast mobile lifestyle, there exists and need to provide such consumer information with readily available information appliances, such as conventional telephones, cellular phones, or other pocket or mobile devices that can provide connectivity to a service at minimum cost.
Frequently such device will have only sparse input/output capabilities. For example, a cellular telephone will typically have only a few display lines presenting text or symbolic data to a user, but has substantial audio input and audio output capability that can be used by the consumer.
Heretofore, speech-to-text conversion has generally been limited to word processing and or computer or control applications as the has required fairly substantial processing power and memory within a computer device. For example, speech to text conversion products made by Dragon Systems (Lernout & Hauspie, Speech Products U.S.A., Inc., 52 Third Avenue, Burlington, Mass. 01803) generally require an Intel Pentium II or Pentium III microprocessor, AMD K-6 or Athlon processor, or the like running in excess of 450 MHz and 128 MB of memory. This technology is not available in conventional or mobile telephones at this time. Text-to-speech conversion has been known but has not been utilized to provide an interactive interface between consumers and consumer information from telephone systems. Such continuous speech recognition systems also usually require voice training with the ultimate user to provide satisfactory results.
Furthermore, even for systems which provided some degree of consumer information over the telephone, such systems have either not attempted to generate business revenues through their operation, or have been unsuccessful in generating significant revenue in this manner. In part the lack of revenue success has been due to a low level of business participation in such systems, the inability of a business to control or modify their message in response to short-term business needs or to sell promote their businesses, as well as the lack of a particular incentive for a consumer to par take all of the information offered by the service. In fact, there may frequently have been a cost associated access to conventional information and referral services by consumers, even if only by virtue of the directory assistance by local telephone service providers.
Some conventional systems and methods have been limited to playback of recorded audio or audio playback corresponding to the content of web pages; but such systems have not integrated Internet or web-based interactions with voice or telephone based information provision. They have also frequently provided inferior voice interfaces that have annoyed callers rather than having provided a useful information experience.
Local as well as national businesses (really any business, merchant, marketing, or other organization) and their customers have made significant sacrifices in order to find each other and conduct a transaction for goods or services. These sacrifices result at least in part from the nature of the information resources available to match businesses and their customers, primary among these information sources are the printed Yellow Pages, on-line Yellow Pages, conventional 411 directory assistance, print media coupons, and on-line coupons.
Businesses (particularly local businesses) make sacrifices when relying on printed Yellow Pages because they are expensive, difficult to sort prices and options, cannot be changed once in print, and their effectiveness cannot readily be determined without additional time consuming and expensive surveys. From customers, or potential customers, perspective sacrifices are made because they are too heavy to carry, present too many choices so that it is difficult for a customer to figure out which one to call as they usually lack the information that may effectively provide the decision criteria, the information is usually stale (12-16 months old is typical), and many customers may forget to take advantage of coupon offers even when available. Printed Yellow Pages and related types of large bulky paper directories clearly have other problems and limitations.
Even on-line or Internet Yellow Pages or directories have limitations that present sacrifices for both merchants and their potential customers. From the merchant's perspective, for example, there are many different on-line directory providers and a business must make a decision as to which one or ones to associate with, a personal computer is required to access and update such directories and may not be available when and where needed, updating may require payment to an ISP or programmer, the directory reaches only those with an Internet connection, and additional fees must normally be paid to place ad banners. From a customer's perspective, the information provided is frequently inaccurate and limited, an interne connection is required to access the information, and either a personal computer or WAP enabled device is required to access.
Local directory assistance and more recently national directory assistance through either a 411 type information service is also limited. From a local merchant's perspective, even when a potential customer receives a correct number the connection may not be made because either the customer must redial to get the number or pay an additional fee to be connected. From a customer's perspective, there is relatively easy access but at a cost of between about $0.50 and $1.00 per call. The directory, particularly when using the wireless directory assistance, is notorious for providing wrong numbers and there is no ability to get the correct number without re-dialing and paying an additional fee. Additional charges are also typically billed for requesting address information if available.
Reliance on print media coupons also entail sacrifices. For example, they are static and cannot be changed once in print. It takes a relatively long period of time between developing the coupon promotion and getting feedback as to its success or failure. Redemption dates cannot be changed, and one merchants coupons frequently get lost in the noise of other unrelated or competing coupons. Customers find it difficult to identify relevant coupons, find it a hassle and hardly worth the time or effort to cut them out or save them, and have a difficult time keeping tract of expiration dates. In some social settings, they present a questionable social image, and cannot always be carried with the person so they are not available when an occasion to use them arises.
On-line coupons are somewhat of an improvement however they still present issues. They are expensive to place at high traffic portals for local merchants, and may still be lost in the noise of other promotions. There is low traffic at coupon only sites and their reach is limited due to the need for an Internet connection. The use of coupons may also be favored by groups that may not have ready access to the Internet. Customers also find them hard to locate and a hassle to pint, copy, or cut out. Access by many groups of persons, or by persons at the time they consider making a purchase may be limited.
In addition to the limitations and sacrifices made by merchants and customers relative to establishing a contact for the provision of goods or services, there currently exist additional problems and limitations relative to wireless data communication of advertising information. For example, infrastructure and methods have not been established or are in their infancy and must be developed before true wireless advertising can become widely available and accepted. Data ready telephone handsets exist but are in the minority and typically represent higher-end and more expensive models. Mobile phones in the hands of the majority of consumers do not provide for wireless interaction with merchants or for the receipt of audio advertising, marketing, or promotional information. Nor are they typically used for voice recognition applications. Merchants have been hesitant to participate in wireless data transactions and the lack of consumer interest in marketing messages generally have contributed to lack of development and progress in this area.
Techniques for building speech recognition applications are some what in their early development stage, however, some information is provided in the reference How to Build a Speech Recognition Application—A Style Guide for Telephony Dialogues, by Bruce Balentine et al., ISBN 0-9671278-1-5, published in 1999 by Enterprise Integration Group, Inc., 2410 San Ramon Valley Blvd., Suite 225, San Ramone, Calif. 94583; which reference text is hereby incorporated by reference.
Therefore there remains a need for a system, method, and business operating model and method that overcome these and other limitations. More particularly, there remains a need for a method of doing business, an information, directory assistance service and referral service providing easy access by businesses and consumers, as well as providing business self promotion and consumer feedback features that encourage use, generate revenues, and provide incentives for use by both businesses and consumers. Such services should advantageously provide more information than traditional 411 type directory assistance in terms of greater amounts of information, greater accuracy and currency of information, award programs, and other features that encourage businesses to participate and consumers to call and utilize such systems.